Broadcasts on commercial broadcast mediums, such as commercial radio or television airwave frequencies, cable television systems, or satellite television or satellite radio systems typically include commercial advertising interspersed within and among featured programs, such as shows, sporting events and news programs. Broadcasts are transmitted on predefined channels of broadcast mediums, however a particular broadcast may be transmitted on more than one broadcast medium at the same time. In particular, broadcast television stations, which historically transmitted solely via commercial television airwaves, are now commonly re-transmit via (i.e., are carried by) cable television systems and satellite broadcast systems as well. Further, the broadcast medium used to deliver the broadcast to a consumer may be operated by a carrier system that is independent of the originator of the broadcast—as is often the case with a broadcast from a broadcast television station delivered to consumers via a cable or a satellite television system.
The broadcasts of multi-market broadcasters, such as national television broadcast networks, national cable network channels, national radio broadcast networks, satellite channels, and the like, include multiple broadcast markets. Examples of national television broadcast networks include ABC, NBC and CBS; examples of nation cable network channels include ESPN, CNN, The Comedy Channel, HBO, etc. To compensate for time differences between distant markets, multi-market broadcasters may transmit (or may direct others to transmit on their behalf) multiple feeds of their broadcast. These feeds may be simply time-delayed or may also include changes in the programming. Some events, like speeches and certain championship sporting events may be covered live across all time zones.
The responsibility for the selection and arrangement of featured programs (i.e., the programming) varies by the type of broadcaster. In the case of television broadcasts, local television stations typically have an affiliation to (and may be owned by) a national television broadcast network (e.g., ABC, NBC, or CBS). The national television broadcast network typically determines and provides all of the programming during predefined “prime time” hours, which are generally the weekday evening hours during which the viewing audience reaches a maximum. The programming during these time periods may be delivered to each affiliated local television station from the national television broadcast network in one or more so called “network feeds.” Local radios stations may have a similar affiliation with a national radio broadcast network that determines certain programming of the local radio station broadcast.
The programming of local broadcasters and of multi-market broadcasters (e.g., a national cable network channel) may also be provided in part by a syndicator, which owns rights to distribute certain programs that are in “syndication.” In the case of a local television broadcaster affiliated with a multi-market broadcast network, programming provided by a syndicator is broadcast in non-prime time hours. Typically syndicators provide programming in all or a large number of the markets in a nation or region.
For the purposes of this description, the organization that determines the programming of a broadcast is described as the broadcast originator or distributor of that programming. Thus, a national broadcast television network is the broadcast originator or distributor of programming which is (usually) aired during prime time hours and other shows which have national interest. Such programming will appear only on the affiliates of that network. Similarly, a syndicator is the broadcast originator or distributor of its syndicated programming broadcast by a local or multi-market broadcaster; however syndicated programs are not restricted to any one network. And, the local broadcaster is the broadcast originator or distributor for programming determined by the local broadcaster itself. For example, a local television station is typically the broadcast originator (or distributor) of non-prime time programming not in syndication, such as a local news program.
Advertisers of commercial goods and services may purchase space for advertising from any of the three types of broadcast originators (or distributors) during the time for which the distributor is the broadcast originator for the programming of a broadcast. An advertising “buy” from a particular distributor may include detailed specifications as to the space(s) desired for the advertisement, such as the featured programs, dates, days of the week, time range, duration, markets and number of instances. The purchase may be for commercial air time on a market or outlet basis (spot or local cable), or it could be at the national network level where its part of the national feed which is sent out across the country. Advertisers also include detailed specifications as to the particular content or advertisements to be placed in the desired spaces (i.e., “traffic” information). The combination of the buy and traffic specifications is referred to herein as “flight information.”
To enhance the effect of broadcast advertising campaigns, an advertiser will often purchase advertising space from a number of different distributors with varied buy and traffic information. Further, typically such purchases may be arranged and managed by an advertising agency or media buyer that may have a large number of such clients. Therefore, it can be appreciated that the tasks of managing and confirming fulfillment of advertising orders can be complex and burdensome.
In an effort to confirm that orders for advertising have been properly fulfilled, entities responsible for broadcasting advertisements (i.e., the broadcast originators or distributors) typically produce sworn affidavits in which the affiant declares that the orders have been satisfied. However, these affidavits are not prepared by disinterested persons and, in addition, are subject to human error. Other efforts to confirm that orders for advertising have been properly fulfilled include the employment of independent human viewers to manually catalog broadcasts of advertisements. This method is also subject to human error, and this method is not feasible for the currently large and continually growing number of broadcasts. Further methods include electronic monitoring of broadcasts. However, none of the confirmation methods known heretofore provide significant advantages or improvements in matching multi-market broadcasts of advertisements to multi-market advertising orders or in providing dynamic reports regarding fulfilled and unfulfilled orders.
Therefore, what is desired is broadcast advertisement tracking, managing and reporting method and system that provide accurate, independent confirmations of the fulfillment of broadcast advertising orders, that provide significant advantages in matching multi-market broadcasts of advertisements to multi-market advertising orders, that provide significant advantages in reporting of fulfilled and unfulfilled orders and that provide such matching, confirmation and reporting for a large number of broadcasts over a large number of broadcast markets.
The present invention overcomes the limitations of prior methods of confirming fulfillment of order for broadcast items, such as commercial advertising orders, and provides substantial improvements in the efficiency and accuracy of such confirmation and in the ability to produce dynamic reports or fulfilled and unfilled orders. A system established according to the present invention includes a plurality of electronic detection devices located in the various broadcast markets that are configured to receive and analyze broadcasts on a number of channels of a number of broadcast mediums.
The detection devices detect instances of actual broadcasts of encoded broadcast items, such as encoded advertisements, and record information regarding each detected actual broadcast in a log. Any suitable method for encoding or assigning unique codes to broadcast items may be employed with the present invention; however, preferably the method is able to detect the date, time, channel and duration of the broadcast item, in addition to the code.
In the method of the present invention, detection information is consolidated from the plurality of detection devices and processed. In the processing of detections, related multi-market detections of instances of actual broadcasts of encoded broadcast items are associated to one another, by one or more computing devices, using various reference data and published program schedules. The associated multi-market detections are then associated with a related multi-market order received from an advertiser or agency to indicate whether, and to what extent, the multi-market order has been fulfilled. Further, single-market detections of instances of actual broadcasts of encoded broadcast items are associated with related market focused advertising orders (i.e., “spot” buys) to indicate whether (and to what extent) the single-market advertising order has been fulfilled. In addition to recognizing accurately fulfilled advertising orders, the method also recognizes a number of predetermined commonly occurring errors in fulfilling orders, such as the broadcast of an incorrect advertisement in the correct space. The method also provides detailed reports of fulfilled, erroneous and unfulfilled advertising orders, with the ability to quickly and conveniently access or, “drill down” to, detailed information regarding the individual detections associated with multi- and single-market advertising orders.